More Than a Number
by Fullmetal-Tora
Summary: It's Exams week at Wammy's and while Mello's diligently focusing on his scores, Matt seems oddly disapproving. Mello wants to be number one. Matt just wants him to be happy. Sometimes it's about more than just numbers and figures. ONESHOT Matt/Mello


It was Exam Week.

No, perhaps it would be more appropriate to say it was the Monday of final exams for the upper-division students of Wammy's Institution for the Gifted.

It was four in the morning. And Mello had an Advanced Criminal Psychology assessment in exactly three and a half hours.

Matt woke up slowly to muted cursing. He peered over with bleary emerald eyes from his comfortably curled-up position in an armchair by the fireplace of the main library and, after a few seconds of blinking dazedly in the general direction of the study tables, identified the source of vulgarity as a particularly large wall of textbooks on the nearest desk.

The precariously leaning towers of schoolbooks cursed again, this time more vehemently, and let out a low groan.

Matt unfolded himself, carefully disentangling his limbs and catching his PSP before it fell out of his lap, where it must have landed when he had dozed off. He stood, still blinking a little stupidly and looked around for the clock that he was certain was supposed to be somewhere on the wall.

Oh. Right. Behind him.

His jaw dropped.

"Oh my f-cking God, Mello, it's _four_ in the f-cking _morning­_! Are you still _studying_?"

The mountain of books cussed at him.

"Mello!"

A sliver of golden-blonde was visible behind the fortress.

"Yes, I'm studying, Matt, now shut the f-ck up and go back to the dorm."

Matt gaped at him. "Mello," he began slowly, reasonably. "It's four. In. The. Morning. You've been here since five in the afternoon. That's almost twelve hours. And then you were here the day before that, too. In fact…" He paused, counting. "You've been practically _living_ in the library for the last goddam week and a half!"

The bit of golden hair peeking out above the stack of textbooks bobbed at him impatiently. "That's not true, Matt," it snapped snidely. "I was in the computer lab Saturday."

Matt had had enough. He stomped toward the desk threateningly, glowering at its occupant over the tops of the book-spires with arms resolutely crossed.

"Mello." His tone was even, flat, firmly no-bullshit.

The scrawny blonde boy sitting at the heavily laden desk gave him the finger and returned to his notes.

Matt was not amused by the flippant dismissal. He continued, trying to remain reasonable, though his patience was wearing thin.

"Mello, if this is about beating Near on tomorrow's--"

The blonde scoffed loudly, not lifting his blue eyes from the paper.

"Oh, I already have the highest grade in Criminal Psych," he boasted, adding decisively under his breath, "And it's gonna stay that way."

Matt peered at the papers the other boy was working on.

"Then why the hell are you writing an essay on" --he squinted--"'the lasting intercontinental effects of the Napoleonic Code on Western law up to the modern era'? What class is that even for?"

Mello again did not bother to grace him with eye contact, punctuating his latest sentence rather viciously to demonstrate his growing impatience. "Extended History of Law," he hissed, with the clear unspoken _'now_ _leave me the f-ck alone'_ unmistakably implied by his tone.

Matt frowned. "Hey, you're not in that class," he pointed out flatly.

"No," Mello affirmed through clenched teeth. He was twirling his pen rapidly between his thumb and forefinger in growing frustration. "They wouldn't let me enroll in more than eight classes, but I'm allowed to take as many exams as I want to and still get credit for the course when I pass them."

Matt's eyes narrowed suspiciously. Though, to be honest, he'd never had the urge to ask to take more courses than minimally required, he hadn't been aware of that tidbit of information.

"And how many tests for classes you're not enrolled in are you taking, Mello?" he asked sharply, leaning over the fortress of books to glare pointedly at his best friend.

Mello finally looked up at him, wearing a scowl which could likely incapacitate small children. "None of your damn business, Matt," he growled, "Now get your ass back to the dorm and pray you don't fail Calculus tomorrow. You haven't studied one minute."

Matt matched his scowl and shook his head reproachfully, ignoring the attack on his own academic success. "No, Mello, you're coming back with me."

The blonde sneered derisively and gave a pointed nod toward the clock. "I wake up for classes in two hours, Matt. Sleeping now would be a colossal waste and won't do shit and you know it." His voice was low and dangerous, absolutely serious. "Now go back to bed and stop wasting my time or I swear I'll give you a black eye. The library lady's asleep anyway, so I won't even get in trouble." He sounded smug, and cracked his knuckles to illustrate his point.

Matt did not try to conceal the offended shimmer in his emerald eyes. His voice was quiet and hurt, and he struck for the most vulnerable area.

"_Near_ went to bed hours ago."

Mello, however, unexpectedly didn't even flinch at the reproach. "So what? That little prick's _always_ ready for bed," he retorted coldly, mumbling something about a 'total lack of f-cking fashion sense' under his breath.

Surprised and rather irked at the failure of his usual sure-fire method of getting the obstinate blonde to pay attention, Matt turned around with a disgusted snarl.

"Fine," he snapped--startling the librarian awake--gathered his PSP and laptop, and stomped past the stack of books behind which the other boy was once more diligently poring over his paper. "Good f-cking luck on your precious exams, Mello."

Matt slammed the door and the librarian gave him demerits.

-- -- -- -- --

Matt was coming back from lunch with half a tuna sandwich in one hand and one of his laptops tucked securely under the other arm, grumbling to himself about the Calculus final between large mouthfuls. He stopped briefly at the door to his Programming class just to double-check that the exam was still scheduled to begin in an hour, and ambled on toward the library.

So he'd probably maybe barely passed his stupid math class, but seeing as he was dead certain Programming would be a total no-brainer and he was going to utterly own, he basically had an hour to waste.

At the f-cking library. Man, he could remember days when free time had been fun, but f-ck if Mello would even hear of anything remotely entertaining recently. And Matt really was very uncreative on his own. Playing his PSP could be done anywhere.

Unfortunately for Matt, Mello was in no mood to listen to his complaints. It only took a second to find the golden-haired boya mere matter of locating the tallest stack of books on the study desksand by the time Matt even started toward him, Mello had noticed.

There followed some quick raging about people who couldn't leave others f-cking alone to study in peace and then about people who possibly could be f-cking brilliant but instead wasted their lives playing mind-rotting shit on useless little light-up rectangles, and then Matt found himself once again earning demerits from the librarian.

He was escorted out shortly after he threatened to punch Mello in the face with some curt reprimands about disturbing the peace during study hours and specifically bothering one of the Elite.

Well, f-ck, Matt wanted to spit. He was f-cking "Elite" in rank too, but no one seemed to f-cking care (actually, he didn't either, but he did resent the fact that he'd have detention for a month with all the demerits he'd accumulated in the last few days).

He flipped off the librarian when she wasn't looking and sat in front of the Programming computer lab trying to hack into the Calculus grades from his laptop until his final started.

Mello didn't come back to the dorm that night either. Matt went to sleep without him after a few more hours of unsuccessfully attempting to alter his math grade.

The next day was quite similar. This time, he and Mello shared a Comparative Government class, and Matt occasionally stole furtive glances at Mello's paper.

Mello noticed and put his arm over his essay with a scowl, bending lower so that his hair hung in a curtain over his work.

Lunch was served along with a loud argument just outside the cafeteria and Matt called Mello a cruel bastard and bemoaned his inability to describe China's government in sufficient detail. The blonde growled at him and retreated to the library with his meager lunch of a stunted-looking green apple.

When Matt found him still in there after dinner, he didn't even try to get angry this time, simply dropping off a few Hershey's bars wordlessly and withdrawing to their room without bothering to wait. His roommate would not be coming.

After finals, Matt was going to f-cking beat Mello up for being the stupidest smart person he had ever known.

-- -- -- -- --

The rest of the week was about as uneventful as the first two days, and just about as wordless. Matt had succeeded in hacking the mainframe, however, and was now happily changing his scores on two or three of his tests. Not too much, not enough for him to shoot up in rank or something, but enough. B+ in Calculus. F-cking hell yes.

Matt was finally finished with tests, and it was well after midnight Thursday night--Friday morning?--that the brunette looked up from his computer at the empty bed across the room. He was sitting on the floor with his back against his own twin bed frame and a sleek black Compaq in his lap.

Chewing on the inside of his cheek indecisively for a few minutes, Matt finally clicked the computer shut, clambered up, attempted to shake the tingling off his legs where they had fallen asleep below the knees, and limped awkwardly toward the nearest vending machine.

Shivering at the sudden gust of cold air and muttering complaints about f-cking spring being just as bad as f-cking winter so far, he returned to the room to slip on the somewhat furry light-brown coat some girl he'd declined to date had gotten him for Christmas last year, then dropped the newly acquired (via vending machine) Hershey's Special Dark bars into the pocket.

Finally having rid himself of the lingering prickle in his calves, Matt strolled down the hallway, much enjoying the fact curfew was lifted during the entire month of exams, and stopped at the library. Dammit, why did it have to be the library? He'd had detention yesterday, and f-ck if the librarian wasn't out to get him or something.

Scowling fiercely toward the softly snoring old woman at the desk, Matt slipped into the room, located the familiar textbook-fortress, and crept toward it cautiously just in case it exploded again as it was prone to do.

When no vulgar threats erupted from the desk, however, Matt raised an eyebrow, shoving his goggles somewhere toward the top of his head in the mass of red-brown hair, and stole a little closer, peering over the stacks of study materials.

Matt blinked.

One arm sprawled across the desktop with fingertips just brushing the ball-point pen which had rolled away when they'd relaxed, cheek plastered to the shiny page of some new history textbook, straight golden-blonde strands splayed across the paper he'd been writing and bangs falling over closed eyes with dark marks underneath, Mello was fast asleep. His shoulders rose and fell rhythmically and his chest pushed gently against the edge of the desk when he breathed. His arms were very thin and pale. There were chocolate wrappers on the floor by his chair and a huge almost-empty thermos of coffee sandwiched between some more textbooks.

Matt should have wanted to punch him, yell at him, and drag him back to the room, possibly tying him to the bed to sleep for a few days straight.

But when he had formulated such plans, Matt had also not expected Mello to look quite so… Defenseless. Exhausted. Adorable.

Skirting around the desk to peer right-side-up this time at the schedule on Mello's folder, he noticed the other boy had only two exams tomorrow. American History and Marksmanship. Well, that was good, Matt was thinking, since Mello was really great at--

Matt did a double-take, eyes widening. The sheer number hadn't struck him before, but now that he was looking at Mello's exam schedule…

The brunette was just preparing to bodily drag his friend to the dorm room when it struck him bleakly instead that, with only two to go, it would be terribly unfair of him. Mello had worked hard. Matt could only watch, and as angry as he could get, he couldn't bring himself to take away from Mello's efforts.

With a sigh, he reached into his pocket to procure the chocolate bars, which he set by the cold coffee, and began to turn away.

Mello shivered slightly.

Matt glanced down at him, unblinking for a few moments, then slowly removed his jacket and placed it over the thin slumped shoulders.

-- -- -- -- --

The next day, Mello was pretty certain he had not done well in American History. Ready to shoot and finally get everything over with, he didn't even notice Matt slide into place just outside the door to the range.

The exam took about an hour, not a bad time considering the fact everybody had to take turns. Mello went last. It was probably a good thing, since he managed to demolish the dummy in three shots.

The instructor beamed at him, slipped him a chocolate bar, and Mello smirked wolfishly. "Playing favorites, sir?"

The instructor made a shushing motion and grinned.

Matt ambushed him outside the room. Mello didn't even have a chance to protect his candy. By the time he realized what was going on, Matt was shoving him into the dorm.

"Matt, what the f-ck are you--?!"

But the brunette was giving him one of those resolute, deeply determined looks he got only when trying to beat a boss in some really hard game. He pushed his goggles to the top of his head.

"Bed."

Mello glared. "It's five in the f-cking afternoon," he pointed out coldly. And Matt had taken his chocolate. F-ck. He was about to profanely demand it back but was cut off.

"Doesn't matter."

Mello looked immensely skeptical.

Matt only saw the fact that he had put some sort of make-up on the circles under his eyes. He noticed when he looked very closely. He wondered how dark they really were.

Matt pushed him onto the edge of the bed.

"You're done, Mello."

The blonde scowled. "But, grades won't be up until--"

Matt gave an exasperated sigh. "Oh, come the f-ck on, Mello, you're not really thinking of staying up until midnight? I bet you you couldn't even last 'til ten."

Mello's expression darkened. "Is that a challenge, Matt?"

Matt smiled darkly.

Mello glared some more, but his eyes weren't nearly as sharp as usual. He blinked, finding them very dry, and fought to suppress a yawn.

Matt took the opportunity to slip a bit of Nyquill into Mello's hot chocolate before handing the drink to the boy. Cold medicine or not, it had been the only thing he could find.

Glaring suspiciously at the unexpected kindness of being prepared a hot drink, Mello took a tentative sip, did not seem to notice the alteration, and downed the rest.

Matt sat on the edge of the bed next to him. He sighed.

"You know you're going to get top scores as usual, Mello. Stop freaking so much."

Mello glowered. "I'm so not 'freaking,' Matt," he snapped. "I just wanted to see--"

"If you're 'number one'?" Matt's tone was almost sad.

The blonde said nothing, but his silence spoke volumes. There was a reason he had taken three more tests than Near. There was a reason he had not eaten or slept properly in over two weeks.

There was a reason Matt was forced to spike his drink with cough syrup.

Matt sighed again.

Mello's eyes were beginning to lose focus, and his attempt to snap back was less than successful. "F-ck yeah… Little albino… bastard…has it coming…to him…"

Matt smiled.

"'Course he does, Mello. Now get some--"

"No." Heavy blue eyes were trying to slip shut. "Grades… will be up…"

Matt shook his head. The memory of Mello passed out on his mountain of textbooks in the library flashed in his mind.

He was losing patience, and the built-up worry over the last days was growing by the second.

"Mello, being number one in class isn't everything," he pointed out softly. "After all, there are more important things."

Mello looked doubtful. And very tired, but he probably didn't mean to show that part. "Like?" he scoffed. Wammy's was based on academic prowess.

Suddenly, Matt lifted an arm and draped it across the bony shoulders, disturbing the straight curtain of gold hair hanging just above them, and pulled the thin form close to his body.

Mello's eyes were too tired to widen in surprise, so he blinked.

"Like being _you_, Mello," Matt was saying quietly. "Like being fun and eccentric and caring deeply and never being afraid to give your opinion. You don't need to compare yourself to him, Mello."

The blonde was scowling again, and tried to push the arm away, but it held him pinned against Matt's side. It was very warm and smelled like familiarity and trust.

"F-cking Near…" was all he managed.

Matt shook his head slowly, cheek brushing golden strands.

"He may be smart, Mello," Matt spoke softly, "But you know you're a hundred times the person he'll ever be. Because you have passion, and conviction, and strength…" He paused for a moment, cheeks flushing slightly. "…and me."

The warmth was spreading into his stomach and Mello was wondering vaguely if that was normal because the hot chocolate hadn't really been all that hot. His mumbled "Huh…?" was only half-conscious.

Matt's flush spread to his ears. "…you say the word, Mello," he was whispering, "And I can do it. I hacked into the mainframe. Your scores are close enough. I could raise them, even switch them, and no one will realize. I could--"

Mello let his cheek fall against the warm support of the striped shoulder and shook his head, very slightly.

"No, Matt…"

"…first in everything," Matt was saying, not having heard. He wore a pained expression, mumbling darkly. "And you'll never have to pull all-nighters for a week ever again, or worry about anything, just get close enough and I can boost your percentages and Near won't stand a chance--"

"No, Matt…"

"…what you've always wanted, right? The reason you do stupid shit like this, the reason you get all pissed at me whenever I try to talk to you and--"

Mello was losing track of the brunette's ranting, but he got the vague feeling Matt was somehow deeply offended, and perhaps alarmed. Mello frowned slightly, trying to remember.

"…and I can help you out so you don't have to--"

Matt paused as something like a tiny laugh escaped Mello's lips. "No, Matt."

Emerald eyes stared down at him in disbelief. "Oh… You mean, you don't approve of cheating…?"

Mello shrugged weakly. "Nah, that's only kind of it… 'S just not worth it… you…"

Matt blinked, then smiled. "You don't want to risk my expulsion or something? Aww, Mello, I didn't know you had so little faith in me," he teased. "I won't get cau--"

Mello shook his head against Matt's shoulder again.

"No, Matt… Do it… on my own…"

Matt sighed. There he went again. 'On my own.' Alone. Without help. Stressing and not sleeping and working far too hard for one person, and yet he'd never accept any help at all. It made something inside Matt cringe and crumble and hurt.

He pulled the painfully slim body closer to his own.

"Why, Mello…?"

But the blonde was asleep. He could feel the steady rise and fall of Mello's chest against his side. Matt was pretty sure the Nyquill hadn't even taken effect yet, but it really hadn't been necessary.

He would print up the grades at midnight and give them to his roommate whenever he woke.

Though really, he couldn't have cared less.

Sighing, Matt rested his cheek for a moment in the soft golden top of Mello's head, then gently lowered him down and covered the finally sleeping form with the blanket from his own bed.

He sat on the edge of the mattress next to him for a long time, simply watching, emerald eyes taking in every detail, drinking it in, memorizing. Porcelain skin and long eyelashes and bright golden hair. Everything exact and perfect and he wanted it to stay that way, and he would make sure it stayed that way. No matter what.

Everything, so precious to him. The only thing so precious to him.

Nobody else had anything to do with it.

Matt brushed his fingers softly over a pale cheek.

"You're always number one, Mello," he whispered, not bothering to get up and turn on a light even as the sun set outside the single window somewhere to his left.

"To me, you've always been, you'll always be… Always first. My number one..."

Mello turned over in his sleep and rested one hand on Matt's knee.

Matt gently closed his fingers around it and smiled.


End file.
